kohlenklau

So many great scenarios that could be written for this mod. Just by myself or with @kevinkin, we just can't pay justice to what COULD be done. Right or wrong, one good way to find the basis of a good CM scenario is to look at other games. ASL is one. Lots of scenarios of a certain type. Smaller OOB's. Not giant battalion level encounters. Here is an awesome one I would love to try and do. IN FRONT OF THE STORM The blitzkrieg in the West had begun. German forces were pouring into France at breakneck speeds. Bridges on the Moselle had been captured undamaged and the advance elements of the 34th infantry Division started to cross as soon as the obstacles installed on the bridges had been removed. One such bridge lay on the outskirts of the French town of Aessan. The job of holding this key objective was given to specially trained and equipped glider troops. As they arrived, they were joined by Vorausabteilung A which had brought up a 37mm anti-tank gun. At midday the 4th Spahis Regiment, supported by Hotchkiss H-35 tanks, counterattacked the bridge at Aessan. Attacker: French (4ème Régiment de Spahis with Armor support) Defender: German (Luftlande Kommando Hedderich and Voraus Abteilung A, Infanterie Division 34) https://www.aslscenarioarchive.com/scenario.php?id=56361 EDIT: LUFTLANDE KOMMANDO HEDDERICH was a German Army unit and they did not land in gliders. They took 25 Fieseler Storchs! 5 men per plane and it was a SPECOPS mission. https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=127886

Oh, well that is very convenient. NEVER MIND!

Alright, we all love Juju's mod and we all pretty much know how busy Ithikial is right at the moment. I have done the leg work on the remaining issue I know of. The new play button. This is like one of those office meetings and you here some whisper from the back...What was wrong with the OLD one? I have no idea. The powers that be changed the names of the little files. I will post some screenshots of the modded buttons. And the new ones too. Maybe we can work together to figure out what to rename as what. Right now I have tried but it don't seem right. Maybe we need one new modded image. Standby. Might not be tonight...over the next few days.

Here is a list of the folders of what is in FR40A BRONZE Level Mod Pack. I will walk through each of what is offered for any comments and so folks can lick their lips! [heerfj] is a folder of the mods to allow the fallschirmjagers (fj) to display like the German Army (heer). This is specifically so I can display the Pak36 37mm ATG. Only way to get it on the CMFI battlefield is by buying fj. buildings: well, an assortment I grabbed way back. It can best be increased. I will swing through it and decide to add stuff from CMBN. I usually open both folders on the screen and split-screen them and grab copy from left and paste to the right and then bulk rename to add [france1940] DMs 1940 Heer is the stuff from the land down under. @Damian45 DMs 1940 Waffen SS Camo. More modding love from the Southern Hemisphere. FR40 French is a bunch of stuff that @Falaise and I cranked out. German Gas Sheet the new gear item made in Blender and textured by forumites! "Nice to Haves" are music, loading screens and splash screens. mountains are your CMBN horizons. Opel Blitz: somebody's early war Opel Blitz. Not mine. I forget who did it. I apologize. Opel Kadet Jeep: an mdr rename to bring that Opel from CMRT to look 1940-ish. paK36 37mm in early war colors I did with help from I think Ben Park. I think. R35. modding Italian R35 over to the French. Stuka attack sounds: a scrounged mod with Hollywood siren and jericho's horn sounds and Stuka image for your air support weapons swaps: renames of various mdr files ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Just a part of the overall mod. Maybe build up some buzz in the forums. Get some attention. Maybe collect a few more scenario writers? A mod in your hard-drive sitting unused -- --is a sad and lonely mod.

Mon ami NOT Mon amor. My additional 2 Euro cents. I guess I get lazy for briefings as the years have gone by. I DO enjoy to write the text file briefing in a certain style. I can share a few below here. You find "your" style. The strat map I just put my kohlenklau logo! The Op Map maybe I just put some cool cropped image. or even leave blank. LAZY MAN The Tac Map I am even getting lazier and don't do. But I used to make my own style with a screenshot of the CM map from up at level 6. I will hunt down some examples. The point is, you don't have to emulate the BFC style for the briefing if you don't want to. But it is a good place to start I suppose. CMFB "Busting Out of Bras"... Play as Axis vs Allied AI only. 1115, 19 December 1944. 8 km east of Bastogne, Belgium. A dense fog reduces visibility. General Bayerlein has created a special group to lead the Panzer-Lehr Division on its way to cross the Meuse River. You are Leutnant Hartmann in charge of the motorized "spitze" composed of pioneer troops, scouts, some half-tracks and 2 tanks. ^ You have only 20 to maybe 30 minutes so use your assigned forces to rapidly press onward and exit off any of the zones marked "Routes forward"... ^ Your forces: On map, you in your 250/1, a kubelwagen and 2 scout teams checking the road on foot. At T=5, the rest of your force arrives. No off-map support is assigned. ^ This is the 3rd day of the secret offensive and the US Army is alerted to our intentions. We do not know what awaits us beyond the fog. These roads are not normally mined as they are the MSR for the allied forces. However, you must keep a close eye for mines just placed on top of the road. Also, watch where any US vehicles travel and it should assure you those areas are safe. ^ Press onward carefully but as fast as possible. ^ EXIT your force: Denies the enemy 100 pts. DESTROY American Forces: up to 100pts. Other hidden touch objectives: up to 40 pts. Map: 1000m x 320m CMRT "A Bridge Too Far-ski" ^ Near Warsaw, September 1944. ^ You are Major Grabnakov, a veteran Red Army cavalry officer. You were severely wounded in combat during the Bagration Offensive. Now you command a scratch detachment of vehicles and reconnaissance troops... ^ A small force of German Fallschirmjagers have landed by glider to take and hold a key bridge over the Vistula while awaiting a panzer kampfgruppe coming from the west. ^ Attack with your available forces to bust through the enemy and take positions to block the panzer force. ^ You have 20-25 minutes to complete your mission. Points are given for destroying the enemy but mostly for exiting your force off the west map edge. This symbolizes you have been able to block the enemy reinforcements somehow. Good luck Comrade! CMFI AFRICA CUTTING OUT A STRONGPOINT ^ 1330, 19 December 1941. 7 miles south of Halfaya Pass, Egypt. During the tedious days of confining the Axis to their ring of frontier fortresses around Halfaya, HQ 4th South African Infantry Brigade authorized a small operation to eliminate an enemy forward position. This strongpoint, manned by mostly Italian troops of the 55th Savona Divisione, was making a nuisance of itself by firing on Allied reconnaissance patrols. B Company, 2nd Royal Durban Light Infantry was assigned to the task of "removing" it. The sky is a haze of dry desert dust kicked up by a light wind from the south. It is hot. ^ You are Lieutenant Nettlestock of B Coy, 2RDLI. You have your rifle platoon. A forward observer is assigned with a limited number of mortar bomb at his disposal. Brigade has promised they will will send light support vehicles from both the 2nd South African AT Regiment and the 6th South African Armoured Car Regiment to support your attack. They should arrive 5 to 10 minutes after your attack starts. ^ Your mission is to assault and clear out the strongpoint. ^ The Italians and some Germans are in trenches surrounded by a belt of anti-tank mines. Reports indicate they have several heavy weapons dug-in and also have artillery support. The axis have mechanized forces only a few miles away which may respond to assist the strongpoint's defence. ^ You are observing that the terrain is mostly flat but some depressions known as "deirs" may offer concealment as you make your approach. You have 20-25 minutes to complete your mission. The tench position is the terrain objective worth 150 points. Both sides also get points for the destruction of enemy vehicles.

Belgian website where you can get maps. 1:25000 https://www.geo.be/map?l=en&x=519464.81&y=6553052.38&zoom=15&topic=fed&baseLayer=ngi.cartoweb.topo_bw.be&catalogNodes=1879&layers=top25map

@Damian45 and I teamed up to do the gas sheet pouch. I hacked it together in Blender and did an initial (lame) image. I combined it to 3 different existing gear models. Then Damian showed up and sprinkled his usual magic on it.

The official templates are at CMMODS at FGM. I THINK Do a forum search and you can often find where the "dead horse has been beaten to death" already. translation: previous in depth lengthy discussions you can gain knowledge from versus a repeat discussion

1940 Panzerwaffe beret...

I will consider I have lectured enough on "Fake Lobster" as nobody had any questions so far. It is what it is! The current schedule for releasing the Mod is as follows: Sunday 9 April: release the BRONZE Mod Pack and whatever BRONZE scenarios we have ready. Sunday 23 April: release the SILVER Mod Pack and whatever SILVER scenarios we have ready. Sunday 14 May: release the GOLD Mod Pack and whatever GOLD scenarios we have ready. Sunday 25 June: release the DIAMOND Mod Pack and whatever DIAMOND scenarios we have ready. Friday 14 July: Bastille Day. kohlenklau retires from CM. I will release a few last minute presents to the CM community.

If anybody wants to team up to make a scenario, your first one ever I guess, I could lend a friendly hand and give advice to really make it go smoother and quicker. I am gonna fully retire from CM stuff in 2 or 3 months so this is your last chance.

Wim, what do you do different for testing if it is a defensive AI plan? I use enemy triggers for a defensive plan so my AI guys would sit idle on defense if the other side had no units to trip the triggers.

ONCE AGAIN... AN OPEN INVITATION FOR FORUM FOLKS TO WRITE AN FR40 SCENARIO USING THE MOD AND I WILL SEND IT OUT WITH ONE OF THE PACKS. PM ME IF INTERESTED.

You're welcome! I can maybe look at the other issue too. I know you're busy somewhere behind Utah Beach...

AND the scenarios will be named to have the mod pack in the title (just the short version: FR40A thru FR40D). for example... FR40A FRENCH BREAD Where the A matches to BRONZE level mod pack

Remember our friendly rule! Adding small things in Blender like a pistol port to REALLY have the look of some early Ausf is BEYOND MY SKILL LEVEL. I will say that one good strategy I COULD easily employ is to offer a scenario where the above models would only be shown as inactive KO'd hulks. Just for flavor to get a good France 1940 vibe. These might still not look perfect down at the rivet counter level but at least they will not function in a manner non-historically and cause somebody stress or emotional discomfort.

The modular buildings allow you to cycle through various facade arrangements of door, long window, window(s), nothing at all just solid, damaged and totally gone. They ship with I think 8 options for textures. The independent buildings just have a few (2?) choices of the texture you see but no cycling of door/window arrangement. 00, 01, etc. Each unit can be renamed. select it and then click rename. It goes to the senior guy of that unit. if he is KIA, then it defaults to the random name of the lucky replacement. EDIT: oh, I read again. commander in second's name. IN THE SAME UNIT? No, not possible. for example platoon HQ can be named as "Meyer" and you see in the game this man's name. If he has other men in that platoon HQ and he is KIA, you can't pre-pick and have waiting "Warner"

"FAKE LOBSTER" continued Continuing my lecture on the elephant in the room..."fake lobster" I call it. Fake lobster is when what you see on the screen is not 100% what the game engine thinks it is. ~~~~~~~~~ D. The Armor mods: 2. AXIS a.PzIV D One of my first Blender vehicle creations...this is an old mod I first did for CMFI CMAK2 AFRIKA. You purchase the PZIII Ausf N Support Tank in the game and my mod then makes it look like the hull of a Panzer IV with 8 road wheels vs 6 per side. The short barrel 75 modded to the PzIV turret. In the above shot I added the jerry can rack. The 808 turret numbers are upside down but I fixed it later. Here it is for France 1940 OK! Let us score it. So, it DOES have the actual short 75 gun. You can dial ammo supply down and try to reduce the HEAT rounds. I have read various about how much HEAT ammo was available and when. Armor thickness in certain areas is more than actual PzIVD. oh well. Love it or leave it I guess. I give her a good B+. She is part of the SILVER LEVEL MOD PACK. I thought to go and remove the turret bin. I had an issue where I still saw shadows that it casts down on the engine deck. I am not sure how to stop them. b. Bufla I made this for my buddy. It is a US Army M3 GMC as the host mdr. Interestingly there is a connection to France 1940 with the M3 GMC. The gun on the M3 GMC is from the French 75. From WW1 but modified. It is a Blender creation plopping a Flak 88 on the half-track from the Flakvierling. It is not as powerful as it should be. Nothing matches that damn 88. But it was fun to play with. I give her a C+. The Bufla will be in the DIAMOND level mod pack. c. Pz III Ausf F with 37mm gun The host is currently the US Army M5 light tank. The shell is the PzIII Ausf G with short 50mm gun. I did not mod the barrel to be lesser diameter. Trying to have an actual 37mm gun on a German tank. I give it a C+. I did remove the turret bin. I gotta rework the paint scheme. She needs work so she is in the DIAMOND level mod pack. Stall for time!!!

I appreciate the kindness in that attitude you say you will approach the mod with. AND YOU ARE RIGHT!!! BFC is never going to do this so this is all we've got using CM. I am not promising 100% satisfaction. I predict somewhere in the 83+/- % satisfaction OVERALL. Today I will continue my lecture on "FAKE LOBSTER" and it gets more intense with the German Armor Mods.

I AM trying to see where the mod can be "rivet counter friendly" and that is where the bronze, silver, gold, diamond levels ALSO come in. The initial parts should be the most friendly to you. The deeper toward diamond, then it goes into territory you will probably not feel comfortable with... THANKS ROB!

I offer this TEMPORARY fix that solves the garbled letters where you see SAVED GAMES AND SAVED GAMES & PBEM for CMBN. The above image makes you think you will have a big blank there under CAMPAIGN? NO!! You will see the proper text of "SAVED GAMES & PBEM". In the UI mod, the file to replace is in Main Menu then subfolder Screen Backgrounds. File is: Splash Background.bmp Download and put in your z folder. Let my new one overwrite the old one. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/dpjskr90mbu0kwh/AADMN5N_uuSWIi6vTpDF20AFa?dl=0

Ithikial is a busy man. So, I offer this TEMPORARY fix that solves the garbled letters where you see SAVED GAMES and SAVED GAMES & PBEM for CMBN. I sent it to @PEB14 for testing. If Ithikial says he does not want me to do this...I will kill the offer to help. It is easier to say sorry than to seek permission.

CMFI FRANCE 1940 MOD PACKS ***I don't have them ready yet**** But here is my system I am going to use! It will be a "tiered" system or whatever might best describe it. I will package the mods to release with scenarios in a consecutive manner over the next couple weeks or months. If you are wanting to play the mod. You gather up all the mod packs as we go on into the summer. Start with bronze, have fun with a few scenarios that have been matched to what bronze mod pack offers. Get it? The scenarios will say somewhere what mod packs they need. If it says silver. then that means both silver and the base bronze. Gold scenario needs gold but also silver and bronze. Finally the diamond scenarios will need diamond and the 3 others. I could have skipped the words bronze, silver, etc and just used A, B, etc. but it seemed a nice way to think of it. FR40A BRONZE LEVEL MOD PACK (should be next weekend 4/8/23 along with several teaser scenarios!) FR40B SILVER LEVEL MOD PACK FR40C GOLD LEVEL MOD PACK FR40D DIAMOND LEVEL MOD PACK I have mods I am still working on and they have been conveniently assigned to the last mod pack, the DIAMOND level. The above system SHOULD allow scenarios to be staggered in development as well. @kevinkin

no idea. sorry. But not a big marketing ploy as the humble door knocker!

What are you asking? I got confused.